A Discourse    on    Old    and  New 
Landmarks; — delivered  in  Tam- 
many Hall,  July  4,  1884, 

BY  THE 

Hon.  Samuel  S.  Cox. 


Tbou  shall  not  remove  thy  neighbor's  landmark,  which  they  of  old  time  have 
set  in  thine  inheritance,  which  thou  shalt  inherit  in  the  land  that  the  Lord  thy  God 
giveth  thee  to  possess  iL— Deut.  xix,  14. 


Avery  Architectural  and  Fine  Arts  Library 
Gift  of  Seymour  B.  Durst  Old  York  Library 


DECAY  OF  INTEGRITY— MORTMAIN  AND  MONOPOLY— 
LAND-TRUST  AND   RESTITUTION— PROGRESS 
AND  POVERTY— A  TIME  EOR  REFORM. 


SPEECH 

OF 

HON  SAMUEL  S.  COX, 

IN 

TAMMAJSTY  hall, 


JULY  4,  1884. 


OM^  //fan  g  6ox^<f 


i 


I 


Still  green  with  bays  each  ancient  altar  stands, 
Above  the  reach  of  .sacrilegious  hands. 


ADDRESS 

OF 

H  0  X .   S .  S .  COX. 


Mr.  Chairman:  Joining  with  you  in  this  patriotic  celebration,  I 
would  like  to  pursue  the  beaten  path.  I  would  like  to  follow  time- 
honored  precedent,  and  dwell  on  the  heroic  achievements  of  the  fathers, 
review  the  proud  progress  of  their  sons,  and  paint  with  the  roseate  hue 
of  prophetic  hope  a  glorious  promise  for  our  posterity.  But  duty  and 
love  of  country  impel  me  to  perform  a  less  pleasing  task. 

Our  past  has,  indeed,  been  of  glorious  record.  Yet,  above  the  not 
■distant  horizon  of  the  future  I  see  dark  clouds  arising,  charged  with 
elements  of  wrath  and  destruction. 

Instead  of  indulging  in  eloquent  memories  and  golden  dreams  of 
progress  and  prosperity,  I  would  call  to  you  from  the  battlements  of 
your  liberties,  and  command  you  to  haste  to  their  defense ;  for  foes  more 
deadly  than  armies  with  banners  encompass  the  walls  of  your  strength 
and  sap  the  foundations  of  your  citadels. 

I  crave  your  indulgence  and  attention  while  I  speak  of  the  disregard 
of  . old  codes  of  faith  and  rules  of  conduct  which  has  become  all  too  com- 
mon in  our  day  and  generation.  My  theme,  to-day,  is  more  of  fleeting 
liberties  than  Independence  won. — It  is:  The  decay  of  Integrity  in  our 
Social,  Political,  and  Business  relations. 

Standing  as  I  do  to-day  among  friends  who  have  known  me  in  the 
two  States  I  have  represented  since  my  early  manhood;  among  friends 
to  whom  every  step  of  my  public  career,  aud  every  act  of  my  private 
life  are  as  an  open  book,  may  I  not  speak  freely  of  the  causes  of  our 
present  national  degradation  ? 

The  prime  cause  was  our  departure  from  the  landmarks  set  by  the 
fathers  when  they  established  the  limitations  of  the  powers  delegated 
to  the  Federal  Government.  I  yield  to  no  one  in  devotion  to  my 
country.  My  every  thought  and  wish  aud  act,  in  peace  and  in  war, 
has  been  inspired  by  devotion  to  the  Federal  Union,  but  I  charge  that 
the  evils  of  the  times  had  their  origin  in  the  breaking  down  of  these 
landmarks.  The  terrible  fratricidal  war  which  twenty  years  ago  del- 
uged the  land  with  blood,  gave  occasion  for  the  exercise  of  Federal 
power  which,  although  necessary  and  therefore  permissible  in  time  of 
war.  grew  into  excesses  and  precedents  for  times  of  peace. 

The  Union  established  by  the  lathers  for  the  common  defense  of  the 
States  and  the  general  welfare  of  the  people,  is  worth  all  the  bloodshed 
and  treasure  expended  for  its  establishment  and  maintenance.  But 
how  long  will  it  be  worthy  of  maintenance  if  the  republican  form  of 
government  gives  place — as  it  is  rapidly  doing — to  a  plutocratic  usur- 
pation of  all  the  co-ordinate  branches  of  the  Federal  Government?  Is 
not  wealth,  or  unscrupulous  fealty  to  corporate  wealth,  fast  becoming 


4 


the  main,  the  only,  and  the  all-sufficient  qualifications  for  the  high 
offices  of  State — executive,  legislative,  and  even  judicial?  What  has 
brought  about  this  woful  anti- Republican  condition  of  affairs?  Is  it 
not  plainly  the  continuance  of  the  extravagances  of  the  wartimes,  when 
the  foundations  of  most  of  the  present  colossal  fortunes  were  laid  in 
great  contracts  and  cemented  with  the  blood,  tears,  and  cruel  taxations 
of  the  people? 

REPUBLICAN  SPOILSMEN. 

While  our  soldiers  were  laying  down  their  lives  for  the  Union  there 
remained  at  home  the  army  contractors  and  spoilsmen,  who  for  four 
long  years  exacted  from  the  people  nearly  $2,000,000  a  day  as  their  pay 
for  devotion  to  the  Union  !  The  service  of  the  contractors  and  spoils- 
men, and  of  the  patriots  who  loaned  the  Government  30  cents  on  the 
dollar  at  heavy  interest,  has  ever  been  regarded  by  the  Republican  party 
as  something  nobler  and  more  worthy  of  acquittance  than  the  patriot- 
ism of  the  people  who  sent  their  sons  to  the  field  and  toiled  to  support 
our  armies. 

Whatever  of  legislation  was  demanded  by  the  contractor,  the  bond- 
•  holder,  or  other  non-combatant  creditor  of  the  nation  has  ever  been 
most  freely  granted  by  Republican  Congresses  and  administrations. 
We  became  so  inured  to  Federal  taxation  and  extravagance  under  Re- 
publican administration,  that  we  looked  upon  an  annual  expenditure 
of  five  or  six  hundred  millions  of  dollars  with  far  less  concern  than  we 
once  regarded  an  expenditure  of  one-tenth  such  outlay. 

Most  of  the  Federal  disbursements  go  into  the  pockets  of  the  vast 
army  of  agents,  officials,  stipendiaries,  and  contractors  which  has  been 
organized  by  the  Republican  party  in  the  twenty-four  years  of  its  power. 
It  now  costs  50  per  cent,  more  to  maintain  the  Federal  Government 
than  it  does  to  support  the  State,  Territorial,  county,  and  municipal  gov- 
ernments of  our  thirty-eight  States  and  eight  Territories. 

If  this  were  the  whole  cost  of  Federal  rule,  the  work  of  reform  would 
after  all  not  be  so  difficult  to  an  honest  party  after  its  administration 
got  into  good  working  order. 

THE  POWER  BEHIND  THE  THRONE. 

But  this  is  not  all  that  a  reform  party  will  have  to  contend  against. 
It  must  encounter  something  stronger,  something  more  exacting  on  the 
people  than  the  grand  army  of  office  retainers  in  the  Republican  party. 
It  must  encounter  a  power  more  compact  and  wealthy  than  that  of  the 
Eepublican  official  organization  itself.  It  must  encounter  the  great 
unofficial  Republican  organization  of  plunderers.  This  power  has  grown 
up  within  the  last  twenty-five  years  under  national  charters,  cash  sub- 
sidies, land  grants,  exclusive  financial  franchises,  and  the  excessive 
profits  of  indirect  tariff  taxations.  This  army  has  now  almost  absolute 
control  of  the  entire  floating  wealth  of  the  nation.  It  has  also  amassed 
the  great  bulk  of  the  fixed  wealth,  either  in  direct  proprietorship  or  by 
mortgage  and  trust  securities. 

THE  AMERICAN  MORTMAIN. 

Nothing  but  the  wonderful  resources  of  our  rich  domain  could  have 
enabled  the  people  to  support  themselves  under  such  long-continued 
and  enormous  exactions  as  those  to  which  they  have  been  subjected 
during  the  past  quarter  of  a  century.  The  immense  flood  of  immigra- 
tion that  poured  in  upon  us  during  that  period  has  helped  to  develop 
those  resources  so  rapidly,  that  to  the  superficial  observer  our  wonderful 
achievements  over  nature  seem  to  be  conclusive  evidence  of  general 


5 


prosperity.  You,  niy  friends,  who  remember  the  condition  of  the 
working  people  of  this  country,  under  the  old  Democratic  regime, 
know  how  fallacious  this  view  is.  You  know,  from  every  day's  ex- 
perience, that  although  our  national  wealth  has  doubled,  quadrupled, 
quintupled,  during  that  time,  it  is  not  shared  by  the  masses  of  the 
people.  It  has  eluded  the  grasp  of  its  producers,  by  some  sort  of 
sleight  of  hand.  This  is  incomprehensible  to  most  people.  But  it  is 
patent  enough  to  even  the  tyro  in  political  economy  that  it  has  been 
gathered  into  the  coffers  of  those  who  own  bonds  and  stocks.  It  has 
been  sequestered  by  companies  to  whom  either  directly  or  indirectly 
have  been  granted  certain  State  and  Federal  powers  and  privileges 
without  any  accompanying  features  of  governmental  responsibility  or 
control  by  the  people. 

There  have  been  opened  to  the  favored  few,  by  legislative  grants  and 
by  the  prostitution  of  legislative  power,  the  opportunities  to  organize 
under  the  cloak  of  the  law  which  enabled  thousands  of  men  to  become 
millionaires  without  ever  earning  an  honest  dollar,  and  hundreds  to 
possess  tens  and  twenties  of  millions  of  the  wealth  we  boast  of  in  our 
statistics. 

Thus  it  has  come  to  pass  in  this  great  country  of  inexhaustible  wealth 
that  the  masses  are  miserably  poor,  that  the  struggle  for  existence  is 
daily  growing  harder  for  them,  and  that  each  year  they  ha ve  less  power 
to  control  or  direct  the  making,  construction,  and  execution  of  the  laws 
of  this  country.  Thus  it  is  that  wealth — vulgar,  coarse,  and  brutal  in 
its  lust,  greed,  and  selfishness — seeks  to  prostitute  every  branch  of  the 
State  and  Federal  governments  to  its  own  ends.  It  has  so  benumbed 
the  senses  of  the  people  that  they  have  come  to  that  condition  in  which 
they  scarce  think  of  the  possibility  of  electing  a  chief  magistrate,  Sen- 
ator, or  even  a  Representative  to  Congress  who  is  not  either  a  million- 
aire or  the  bondsman  of  a  great  corporation.  What  a  humiliation  it  is 
to  be  compelled  to  acknowledge  such  a  falling  away  of  patriotism  !  Are 
we  worthy  of  the  liberties  won  by  our  ancestors '? 

THE  DECLARATION  OF  LIBERTY. 

Our  ancestors  never  made  a  declaration  of  liberty  against  the  tyranny 
of  money.  They  never  dreamed  that  their  sons  could  become  the  slaves 
of  such  a  power.  When  they  signed  the  document  which  ushered  in 
our  year  of  political  jubilee  they  struck  for  independence.  They  as- 
serted their  independence  because  the  form  of  government  in  the  mother 
country  became  destructive  of  the  ends  of  liberty.  When  they  made 
a  list  of  their  grievances  against  the  British  Crown  they  were  not  appre- 
hensive about  anything  except  the  deprivation  of  their  liberties.  On 
a  little  tea,"  they  cried,  "  depends  all  of  freedom." 

The  British  king  had  become  arbitrary  about  his  assent  to  the  laws. 
He  had  become  negligent  of  laws  of  pressing  importance.  He  had  re- 
fused laws  passed  under  the  right  of  representation.  He  had  worried 
legislative  bodies  so  as  to  fatigue  them  into  compliance.  He  dissolved 
them  at  his  will.  He  kept  them  inert  at  his  pleasure.  He  hindered 
that  prosperity  which  comes  of  population,  naturalization,  and  migra- 
tion. He  hindered  the  ' 1  appropriations  ' '  of  land.  He  obstructed  j  us- 
tice  and  corrupted  judges;  he  sent  swarms  of  new  officers  to  harass  the 
people,  and  quartered  on  them  standing  armies  without  legislative  con- 
sent; he  gave  consequence  to  the  military  above  the  civil  power;  he 
instigated  his  soldiers  to  outrage  and  protected  them  from  punishment. 

Moreover,  he  was  a  tyrant  in  reference  to  the  liberalities  of  trade. 


6 


He  refused  to  this  country  the  right  of  commerce  with  all  parts  of  the 
world.  He  shackled  industry  not  only  by  taxes  without  consent,  but 
by  other  arbitrary  methods.  It  was  not  enough  that  he  took  away  our 
charters  and  abolished  our  laws,  suspended  legislatures  and  arrogated 
to  himself  the  legislative  function,  but  he  waged  war  against  us  with 
all  its  horrors  of  ravaged  coasts,  plundered  seas,  burnt  towns,  and  de- 
spoiled lives.  The  mercenaries  whom  he  brought  here  to  complete  his 
work,  and  the  merciless  savages  whom  he  brought  against  the  inhabit- 
ants of  our  frontiers  made  his  rule  abhorrent  in  the  eyes  of  civilized 
nations. 

All  these  grievances  are  as  nothing  now. 

These  infractions  of  personal  and  public  liberty  now  excite  no  appre- 
hension. "We  are  still  a  free  people.  We  are  ruled  by  ourselves.  But 
how  long  will  the  institutions  of  our  fathers,  honeycombed  as  they 
now  are  by  fraud,  permeated  by  selfishness  and  putrescent  with  cor- 
ruption, remain  as  the  witnesses  of  the  heroic  struggles  of  a  hundred 
years  ago  ?  What  are  magna  chartas  and  bills  of  rights  and  muni- 
ments of  personal  freedom,  the  grand  incentives  to  public  content  and 
private  fortune,  when  the  air  is  fetid  with  poison  and  the  Government 
has  degenerated  into  a  moneyed  cabal  ?  1"~  ... 

The  Fourth  of  July  has  long  been  a  white  day  in  the  national  cal- 
endar, but  how  long  will  it  remain  so  if  we  abandon  the  elemental 
forces  by  which  our  fathers  acquired  their  independence  while  preserv- 
ing their  liberties  ? 

THE  NATAL  DAY  OF  INDEPENDENCE. 

Our  fathers  were  wont  to  celebrate  the  natal  day  of  American  Inde- 
pendence as  men  whose  glory  it  was  to  feel  and  know  that  theirs  was 
a  land  of  liberty  and  plenty;  a  land  where  poverty  and  riches  were 
alike  unknown;  a  land  where  the  people  ruled;  a  land  where  patriot- 
ism, moral  worth,  and  intellectual  power  were  the  only  sure  passports 
to  popular  favor.  What  changes  have  been  wrought  among  us  in  a  few 
short  years — in  the  flight  of  a  single  generation  !  Then,  we  were  in  very 
truth  a  commonwealth;  now,  we  are  a  nation  with  rulers  set  over  us. 
Then,  ' '  our  country  ' ;  was  the  theme  of  all  our  eloquence,  and  liberty 
our  highest  aspiration.  Now,  a  most  ignoble  ambition  is  eminent  and 
dominant.  It  rules  the  press,  the  pulpit,  and  the  arena  of  politics.  I 
mean  the  inordinate  desire  for  wealth  that  scruples  at  no  means,  how- 
ever dishonorable,  that  will  secure  its  gratification  even  at  the  expense 
of  the  general  prosperity.  The  frequent  acquisition  of  sudden  wealth, 
which  was  so  notorious  during  the  late  war,  seems  to  have  developed 
among  us  a  spirit  of  insatiate  greed. 

SPECULATION  AND  BUSINESS  INTERESTS. 

Is  it  indeed  true  that  "money  answereth  all  things "  ?  Is  it  indeed 
true  that  our  country  has  "  waxed  fat  and  kicked  "  ?  The  acquisition 
of  wealth  by  sinister  methods,  in  the  marts  of  money  in  the  great  me- 
tropolis, at  20  per  cent,  a  month,  is  but  one  of  many  recent  develop- 
ments leading  up  to  the  craze  of  speculation  and  the  insanity  of  gam- 
bling. Is  it  true  that  the  old  prudence,  which  is  itself  a'virtue,  the 
heroic  loyalty  to  conscience,  and  the  faith  in  a  Supreme  Ruler  have 
given  way  to  the  self-seeking  promptings  of  inordinate  gain?  The 
panics  in  our  streets  and  the  prisoners  in  our  jails  are  living  illustra- 
tions that  the  Pecksniffs  are  not  all  gone;  that  the  Pharisees  are  yet 
making  broad  their  phylacteries.  V 

It  is  true  that  our  civilization  creates  many  wants,  many  tempta- 


7 


toons.  It  has  taken  hold  of  the  people;  it  moves  them  to  the  front; 
it  engenders  a  desire  for  luxury  and  prodigality  which  too  often  be- 
numbs the  scrupulous  moral  sense  in  the  hurry  for  the  attainment  of 
wealth.  The  ambition  to  become  rich  has  tainted  almost  every  depart- 
ment of  social  life.  It  has  become  the  common  incentive  to  almost 
every  financial  fraud  and  crime.  It  has  been  left  for  this  summer  and 
New  York  city  to  show  us  how  "business  interests"  can  be  trans- 
formed and  developed  in  a  way  never  before  defended  in  the  forum  of 
conscience.  Whether  in  the  daily  investment  of  capital  or  in  the  in- 
crease of  professional  practice,  adventurers  of  all  kinds  seek,  with  fair 
prospects  of  success,  to  reach  social  standing  by  the  prostitution  ot 
trusts.  The  great  mass  of  society  in  the  cities  has  been  leavened  by 
this  most  undesirable  element. 

MERETRICIOUS  CANDIDATES. 

In  the  selection  of  candidates  for  the  highest  trust  known  to  civili- 
zation the  eyes  of  the  people  and  their  delegates  have  been  blinded  by 
the  dazzle  of  wealth.  They  fail  too  frequently  to  see  that  the  methods 
of  gain,  however  successful,  are  not  always  such  as  comprehend  justice, 
the  dignity  of  mankind,  or  the  brotherhood  of  the  nation.  In  other 
words,  the'  pleasures  of  social  and  sensual  life  have  become  so  para- 
mount as  to  allure  the  imagination  of  the  people  toward  the  exalta- 
tion of  meretricious  splendor  and  sensuous  display  over  modesty  and 
solid  worth.  The  self-styled  "party  of  moral  ideas,"  which  boasts  ot 
the  culture  of  the  schools,  of  the  higher  thought,  of  the  finer  feeling, 
of  the  nobler  ambition,  and  of  intellectual  exaltation,  has  long  since 
succumbed  before  the  insolent  plutocratic  assurance  which  undertakes 
to  record  in  advance  of  the  ballot  the  people's  verdict  at  the  polls. 

How  long  shall  such  methods  of  intrigue  be  allowed  to  manipulate, 
bargain  for  and  capture  the  highest  candidacies  of  the  Republic  ?  How 
long  is  this  party  of  wealth,  hypocrisy,  chicanery,  and  fraud  to  ad- 
minister the  public  trusts  ? 

REVIVE  THE  OLDEX  SPIRIT. 

Upon  the  recurrence  of  this  patriotic  season,  made  memorable  by 
the  self-sacrifices  of  patriots,  who  pledged  fortune,  life,  and  sacred 
honor  to  maintain  their  independence  and  confirm  their  liberties  to 
posterity,  it  is  especially  becoming  in  us  to  determine  that  extrava- 
gances and  glitter,  epicurean  luxuries  and  treacheries,  financial  and 
political  frauds  shall  receive  the  condemnation  which  righteous  indig- 
nation and  common  honesty  should  heap  upon  them.  It  is  especially 
fitting  that  we  should  commend  that  enthusiasm  of  patriotism  which 
over  a  hundred  years  ago  consumed  in  its  wrathful  fire  the  miserable 
selfishness  of  men,  gave  revival  to  conscience,  and  shone  like  a  precious 
gem  in  the  crown  of  Liberty.  To  despair  of  one's  country  is  dastardly. 
He  is  a  graceless  son  who  will  not  aid  his  mother  in  her  extremity. 
More  need  then  of  hopeful,  helpful,  invigorating  works. 

If  there  be  one  way  more  than  another  in  which  popular  sovereignty 
may  be  overthrown  most  speedily  and  dishonored  most  ignobly,  it  is 
that  by  which  our  public  service  is  made  the  feudal  retainer  of  corpo- 
rate wealth,  and  the  goal  of  spoilsmen  intent  only  on  private  aggran- 
dizement. It  is  a  sad  day  for  our  country  when  a  small  coin  no  larger 
than  one's  eye  is  brought  so  near  to  constituent  and  representative  that 
its  disk  shuts  out  the  whole  horizon  of  social  and  political  life.  The 
history  of  nations  shows  that  it  is  not  impossible,  by  abruption  in  one 
ignoble  pursuit,  to  lose  that  spiritual  vision  which  gazes  undazzled  a 


8 


the  full  noonday  radiance  of  alluring  ambitions.  How  hard  for  man 
to  resist  temptations  when  such  as  now  allure  were  even  offered  to  Di- 
vinity itself.    I  do  not  despair. 

I  am  not  as  one  without  hope.  We  have  not  all  bowed  the  knee  to 
Baal.  I  feel  that  I  am  among  men  who  are  not  altogether  engrossed 
in  the  pursuits  of  avarice;  men  who  engage  in  daily  toils  and  nightly 
meditations  that  are  more  attractive  than  the  chink  of  silver  or  the 
rustle  of  greenbacks;  men  who  can  enjoy  books  more  interesting  and 
inspiring  than  the  ledgers  of  the  counting-room.  Thank  God,  we  are 
not  yet  as  a  nation  altogether  bankrupted  in  patriotism  and  selfish  in 
greed. 

JUDGE  CANDIDATES  BY  THEIR  LIVES. 

In  a  year  like  this,  when  we  should  select  our  leading  officers — Fed- 
eral, State,  and  municipal — with  a  view  to  the  general  welfare,  is  it  not 
our  duty  to  inquire  into  the  causes  of  the  untrustworthiness  which  has 
become  all  too  common  in  public  and  private  administration,  in  order 
that  they  may  be  removed  by  such  an  exercise  of  long-outraged  and 
indignant  suffrage  as  will  tend  to  exalt  honesty  over  greed?  Our  news- 
papers are  full  of  the  catalogues  of  speculative  liabilities,  aggregating 
millions  in  amount.  They  are  full  of  the  long  lists  of  stocks  and  bonds 
pledged,  or  purloined  to  be  pledged,  in  dishonest  schemes  from  which 
thousands  of  innocent  people  have  grievously  suffered.  The  ventures 
pertaining  to  some  of  these  peculiar  transactions  have  come  very  near 
to  my  own  city  and  the  Federal  Government.  This  startling  array  of 
fraud  and  speculation  is  a  warning  against  the  selection  for  high  public 
trusts  of  mere  "businessmen."  Their  political  and  financial  trust- 
worthiness has  not  stood  the  test  of  public  scrutiny. 

Blackstone  said  that  it  required  thirty  years'  study  of  the  law  in  order 
to  become  so  imbued  with  its  principles  as  to  be  qualified  to  administer 
it  in  the  courts.  There  is  great  wisdom  in  this  view  of  the  learned 
commentator.  Xo  man  can  be  a  student  and  practitioner  of  law  for 
thirty  years  without  having  established  a  well-deserved  reputation 
either  for  integrity  and  ability,  or  for  dishonesty  and  chicanery,  or  for 
honesty  and  mediocrity.  The  same  is  true  of  persons  who  have  held 
offices  of  honor,  profit,  or  trust  for  any  considerable  time.  Their  acts 
and  modes  of  life  are  the  fruits  by  which  they  are  to  be  judged. 
Judging  candidates  for  offices  and  trusts  in  this  way,  and  giving  our 
suffrages  to  the  competent  and  worthy  only,  would  soon  bring  to  us 
the  reform  we  so  sadly  need.  I  do  not  concur  with  those  who  would 
regulate  our  State  and  Federal  administration  on  "  business  principles. " 
I  desire  a  higher  standard  in  our  public  agents  than  that  of  mere 
faithful  employes  and  wage-earners.  I  would  have  no  offices  of  profit. 
All  should  be  of  honor,  trust,  and  modest  compensation,  and  filled 
only  by  those  of  proven  ability  and  integrity.  I  would  make  office- 
holding  not  merely  an  educational  reward,  but  an  award  of  civic  honor 
to  patriotism,  capacity,  and  unquestioned  integrity.  Especially  would 
I  demand  such  qualifications  in  the  legislators,  the  judges,  and  the 
more  important  executive  offices.  The  minor  offices,  like  the  streams 
from  pure  or  turbid  fountains,  will  partake  of  the  translucence  or  the 
tinge  of  the  sources  from  whence  they  flow. 

true'civil-service  reform. 
If  we  had  such  a  civil-service  reform  as  this,  would  there  be  the  place- 
hunting,  the  arrogance  and  riotous  display  of  wealth  by  men  in  public 
stations  that  is  such  conclusive  evidence,  in  thousands  of  cases,  of  the 


9 


ill-gotten  gains  that  grow  out  of  corrupt  contracts  for  public  service., 
barters  of  political  influence,  embezzlements,  speculations  with  public 
moneys,  and  other  breaches  of  official  trusts?  Every  fifth  year  the 
ancient  Romans  had  their  lustrum — their  year  of  purification,  of  cen- 
sus, of  apportionment  of  public  burdens,  of  accounts  of  stewardships. 
How  long  has  it  been  since  our  nation  had  its  lustrum  ? 

It  is  an  old  rule  of  Democratic  faith  that  the  money  of  the  people 
should  not  be  deposited  in  banks  designated  by  officers,  to  be  trallicked 
in  at  pleasure  and  tempt  to  speculations  that  end  in  bankruptcy.  The 
sub-treasury  system  of  the  United  States  grew  out  of  this  jealousy  for 
the  safe-keeping  of  the  public  funds.  How  the  times  have  changed. 
Not  long  since  a  bank  in  New  York  city  had  in  its  vaults,  by  permis- 
sion of  a  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  securities  and  mone3Ts  of  the  United 
States  resulting  from  securities  amounting  to  nearly  fifteen  millions, 
free  to  speculate  in,  without  any  bonded  liability  to  the  Government  in 
case  of  loss.  I  will  not  assert  that  this  was  the  result  of  a  corrupt  bar- 
gain; but  I  will  say  that  such  questionable  conduct  in  an  office  of  great 
public  trust  should  be  regarded  as  conclusive  evidence  of  want  of  virtue 
in  the  incumbent.  It  is  sufficient  ground  for  divorce  from  the  public 
service.  It  is  only  a  matter  of  good  luck,  perhaps,  that  in  the  case  re- 
ferred to  speculation  did  not  run  so  high  as  to  have  absorbed  or  sunk 
the  millions  deposited. 

THE  GENERAL  DISTRUST. 

It  is  a  matter  of  sadness  for  many  a  stockholder  that  a  shrinkage  of 
ten  millions  occurred  the  other  day  in  one  of  our  railroads,  for  which 
there  was  no  compensation  in  the  shrinkage  in  value  of  a  millionaire's 
assets  of  twenty-three  millions.  A  depreciation  of  forty  points  on 
twenty-five  millions  of  bonds,  equal  to  ten  millions  of  shrinkage,  not 
only  affected  by  its  reaction  other  investments  at  home,  but  in  the 
present  condition  of  freightage  proved  a  terrible  blow  against  the  pros- 
perity of  railways,  their  operation  and  extension.  It  begat  in  foreign 
investors  distrust  of  American  securities  sudden  and  disastrous. 

Are  we  to  learn,  under  the  untrustworthy  associations  of  to-day,  the 
lesson  that  no  confidence  can  be  placed  in  any  man,  however  high  or 
proud  ?  The  game  of  hazard  has  been  often  played,  by  men  of  high 
social  standing,  in  cotton  and  grain,  in  clothing  and  food.  Speculation 
has  run  riot,  loans  have  been  shifted,  and  business  disturbance  become 
turbulent.  The  banks  that  are  now  maintained  for  the  purpose  of  giv- 
ing a  safe  and  uniform  currency  to  the  people  at  a  cost  to  the  tax-payers 
of  from  2.70  to  4.50  per  cent,  of  their  issue,  have  become  so  tainted  by 
participation  in  these  transactions  that  Congress  is  now  seeking  to  learn 
something  about  the  unsound  condition  of  their  reserves  and  securities. 
The  people  demand  to  know  why  the  recent  enormous  shrinkage  in 
values  has  begotten  such  a  shrinkage  of  confidence  in  respect  to  all 
financial  operations. 

VARIETIES  OF  FRAUD. 

Army  officers  duplicate  their  pay  until  the  son  of  Lincoln  loses  pa- 
tience at  their  petty  devices  of  fraud,  and  court-martials  are  called  too 
late.  Unrecorded  vouchers  invade  the  Naval  Bureau  of  Medicine  and 
Surgery.  Armory  contracts  display  frauds.  "We  see  fixed  returns  of  the 
rotten  railroads  that  owe  the  Government  moneys  not  computable.  Our 
Land  Office  shivers  under  600,000  pending  claims  for  7,000,000  acres  of 
public  lands,  mostly  claimed  by  land  thieves.  It  is  not  alone  the  starry 
route,  and  vast  largesses  in  the  elections  of  1880.  nor  the  use  of  money 
to  buy  mercenary  delegations  at  Chicago.  It  is  not  alone  that  the  Govern- 


J 


10 

ment  seeks  to  hide  its  schemes  of  aggrandizement  under  secrecy,  so  as 
to  disburse  a  quarter  of  a  million  to  the  congress  and  newspapers  of 
Central  America  for  private  ends  and  canal  projects.  It  is  not  alone 
the  acquisition  by  hook  and  by  crook  of  "20.000,000  of  acres  of  our  soil 
held  by  foreigners.  It  is  not  alone  giving  to  France  and  England 
control  of  our  Isthmian  routes.  It  is  not  alone  the  system  of  absentee 
landlordism  that  exists  in  DakDta  and  other  Territories  to  blight  our 
heritage  as  it  has  blighted  the  fertile  fields  of  Ireland.  It  is  not  alone 
the  railroad  wrecker  and  repudiator  who  strove  to  wrest  Old  Virginia 
from  her  ancestral  politics. — These  and  the  thousand  other  frauds  wring 
from  such  Republicans  as  George  William  Curtis  the  following  con- 
fession : 

Honest  and  economical  administration,  peaceful  and  honorable  foreign  rela- 
tions, the  progressive  purification  of  the  public  service  at  home,  wise  reduction 
of  tfie  revenue,  and  that  sense  of  general  security  which  springs  from  the  moral 
elevation  of  the  Administration — are  not  to  be  expected  from  Republican  suc- 
cess. 

THEIR  NAME  IS  LEGION*. 

A  clerk  has  lucky  speculations  among  his  Xorwalk  (Ohio)  neighbors, 
while  pocketing  fifty  thousand  of  their  earnings.  A  railroad  magnate 
mismanages  his  road  between  Xashville  and  Louisville,  but  manages  to 
get  caught  on  3200. 000  restitution  of  unlawful  funds.  Insurance  rogues 
deal  with  Death,  and  call  in  the  gospellers  to  help  his  claims.  Suicides 
become  common,  and  the  coroners  find — ''deficits."  Even  staid  Bos- 
ton has  her  scandal  of  gas  bribes  to  senators  for  their  votes.  Poultices 
and  plasters  help  the  weak,  bail  bonds  and  Government  counsel  help 
the  wicked.  The  outcasts  of  dishonesty,  base  all  their  hopes  on  the 
possible  election  of  a  Republican  candidate.  Yet  this  dark  cloud  has 
some  silver  lining — a  few  earnest  and  honest  Republicans  protest. 

What,  asked  an  English  paper,  makes  the  American  a  more  danger- 
ous gamester  than  the  Frenchman  or  Englishman  ?  This  was  its  an- 
swer: 

"What,  indeed,  is  ruin  in  that  exhilarating  air,  with  nobody  caring,  and  thir- 
ty-six States  around  you  offering  to  the  skillful  30,000  ways  of  making  money  ? 
An  attack  of  dyspepsia  is  far  worse;  and,  in  fact,  when  a  prominent  American 
is  ruined  we  generally  hear  that  he  is  "sick,"  and  that  his  friends  upon  that  ac- 
count are  full  of  anxiety  for  his  future. 

THE  SPIRIT  OF  GREED. 

What  cable  can  tether  or  chain  bind  this  spirit  of  unholy  greed  in 
private  and  public  life?  Whether  in  the  canons  of  the  Colorado,  deep 
down  below  the  sound  of  human  woe,  or  within  the  rocky  volumes  of 
the  geologic  and  prehistoric  eras,  where  the  simple  Zuni  worships  like 
an  Oriental,  or  upon  the  unctuous  soil  of  the  Indian  reservations,  where 
the  red  man  imagines  that  he  is  located,  as  long  as  grass  grows  or  water 
runs,  this  spirit  of  greed  is  there,  rolling  arable  acres  as  a  sweet  morsel 
on  its  tongue.  It  hovers  over  the  splendid  Yellowstone  Park,  where 
the  laboratories  of  nature  are  producing  by  their  perpetual  chemistry 
the  weird  wonders  which  the  pencil  and  easel  of  Durant  have  made 
familiar  to  us.  Go  to  the  uttermost  parts  of  our  land,  from  the  Teche, 
where  the  alligator  fights  the  sugar  planter  with  a  show  of  teeth  not 
unlike  his  own  tariffs,  to  the  Red  River  of  the  Xorth,  the  vales  of  Mon- 
tana, and  snow-capped,  verdure-robed  Cascades  of  the  far  Northwest; 
and  lo !  the  greedy  spoiler  is  on  the  wing — prospecting,  engrossing  and 
blighting  our  fair  domain,  the  heritage  of  our  children's  children  ! 

THE  DECAY  OF  INTEGRITY. 

All  these  matters  can  be  referred  to  the  decay  of  integrity  in  politics, 
business,  and  society.    A  few  days  ago  the  criminal  judges  of  New 


11 


York  city  delivered  charges  to  the  grand  jury  in  which  they  commended 
our  police  and  our  criminal  jurisprudence.  They  said  that  the  persons 
and  property  of  our  people  are  protected  from  the  ordinary  felon  and 
bully.  This  is  undoubtedly  true.  Reasonable  protection  has  been 
given  against  the  common  robber  and  burglar.  Even  the  bunko  men 
and  other  vagrants  have  been  apprehended  in  their  pel  i  t  larcenies.  But 
the  instances  which  occur  to  you  upon  the  west  side  of  this  city,  as 
well  as  in  other  cities — in  Pittsburgh  and  Newark — show  that  the  rot- 
tenness of  our  society  prevails  not  so  much  on  the  outside  as  inside 
of  our  institutions.  For  example,  there  was  the  Penn  Bank,  named 
after  the  mild  and  honest  Quaker  of  Pennsylvania.  It  had  provisos 
against  any  stockholder  or  officer  being  liable  or  assessable  for  an  amount 
greater  than  the  face  value  of  his  stocks.  It  received  deposits  by  the 
millions.  The  other  day  the  depositors  found  little  or  no  assetsaud  two 
millions  of  their  money  gone!  Better  than  burglars'  jimmies  or  out- 
siders were  the  insidious  banker's  instruments  of  wholesale  robbery  in 
Pennsylvania.  Such  instances  of  plunder  are  more  emphatic  in  pro- 
ducing industrial  depression  than  your  masked  tariffs  and  taxations. 
How  was  the  collapse  of  this  bank  managed  ?  By  fictitious  entries  of  de- 
posits. This  bank,  like  others,  became  simply  a  medium  of  respectable 
rascality.  How  much  of  a  dividend  will  the  little  remnant  of  assets 
give  the  depositors?  Who  among  the  gang  of  defrauders  will  wear 
the  striped  clothes  of  the  penitentiary?  Men  like  Vanderbilt  mas- 
querade upon  the  books  of  the  bank,  and  oil  speculations  gave  lubricity 
to  the  slipperiness  of  its  officers. 

It  is  no  satisfaction  to  know  that  the  fiduciary  guardians  of  the  West 
Side  Savings  Bank,  with  its  disappearing  cashier,  lamented  in  deepest 
sorrow  the  necessity  for  suspension.  They  regretfully  closed  the  doors 
against  the  men  and  women  who  sought  the  hard-earned  money  they 
had  deposited  with  them.  It  is  no  satisfaction  to  know  that  the  Stock 
Exchange  is  excited  over  the  tumbling  down  of  gilded  hopes.  How  sad 
that  the  head  office  of  Jerry  McCauley'sCremorne  Mission  is  now  vacant 
for  another  Wall  Street  saint.  It  is  little  satisfaction  to  know  that  it  is 
easier  for  such  rich  men  to  go  through  the  eye  of  a  needle  than  to  enter 
the  kingdom  of  Heaven. 

LEGALIZED  GAMBLING. 

Much  has  been  said  by  our  purist  committees  from  the  Legislature 
about  the  prevalance  of  gambling  houses  in  our  great  cities.  It  seems 
to  have  been  overlooked  that  these  houses  exist  by  reason  of  the  insa- 
tiate craving  created  by  the  business  of  the  exchange ;  for  what  is  its 
business  unless  it  be  betting  on  the  price  of  stocks  under  the  pretext 
of  purchase?  Faro  is  respectable  and  poker  courageous  in  comparison. 
In  these  games  other  people's  money  is  not  always  risked.  The  law 
may  make  a  difference  between  these  and  other  games  of  chance,  but 
as  between  a  bucket-shop  and  a  put-and-call  establishment,  as  between 
a  margin-dealer  and  a  roulette-player,  there  is  little  or  no  moral  dif- 
ference. If  there  be  any,  it  is  in  favor  of  the  bucket-shop  and  the  rou- 
lette-wheel. It  is  this  passion  for  gambling  that  is  at  the  bottom  of  the 
methods  of  the  conventions  and  the  street. 

To  these  methods  may  be  attributed  the  cause  of  much  political 
baseness  and  social  decay.  The  capitalist  who  deals  in  futures,  is  in 
some  respects  better  than  he  who  speculates,  to  the  ruin  of  innocent 
families,  with  money  not  his  own.  Yet  both  are  gamblers.  Embezzle- 
ment, fraud,  defalcation,  theft,  all  the  phases  of  financial  crime  are  be- 
gotten by  this  illicit  passion  for  gain.    As  the  cause  of  causes,  this  pas- 


12 


sion  is  more  harmful  than  all  the  other  business  schemes  of  men  who 
seek  to  engross  the  patrimony  of  the  young  and  the  honest  earnings  of 
the  old.  The  time  may  come  when  the  now  respectable  dealers  in  these 
games  of  chance  will  be  branded  as  destroyers  of  families,  and  their 
operations  be  condemned  as  incentives  to  unlawful  speculation.  So 
long  as  these  games  of  chance  are  conducted  as  legitimate  business  by 
the  pious  and  devout,  by  the  long-faced  hypocrites  and  Tartuffes  of  so- 
ciety, just  so  long  should  wealth  so  gained  be  regarded  with  scorn  and 
indignation.  Is  it  from  this  school  of  gamblers  that  we  are  to  take  les- 
sons in  "business  methods,"  administration,  and  public  policy? 

OUR  "WEALTH  ENGROSSERS. 

Time  was,  at  the  beginning  of  this  generation,  when  the  property  of 
the  country  was  more  generally  shared  by  the  people  than  now.  There 
was  then  not  so  much  value  per  capita  in  the  country;  but  the  people 
were  more  contented.  There  was  then  little  of  private  defalcation  and 
less  of  public  dishonor.  Xow  we  have  our  Goulds  and  Vanderbilts  and 
others  who  engross  most  of  the  wealth  of  the  nation.  No  one  is  con- 
sidered in  the  roll  of  wealth  to-day  who  does  not  list  his  property  by 
the  million.  The  vast  assets  of  our  great  millionaires  were  accumu- 
lated, not  by  the  ordinary  rise  of  values  incident  to  our  industrial  devel- 
opments, but  by  the  watering  of  stocks  aided  by  corrupt  courts,  the 
subtle  artifices  of  bribed  legislators,  and  combinations  organized  for  the 
spoliation  of  honest  stockholders. 

It  is  not  worth  while  to  speak  to  you  in  detail  of  the  enormous  swin- 
dles, heaped  like  Pelion  on  Ossa,  by  which  hundreds  of  millions  of  ill- 
gotten  gains  have  been  accumulated  in  the  hands  of  a  few  financial 
conspirators.  Perhaps  the  remarks  already  made  may  be  sharply  criti- 
cised because  they  relate  to  private  and  not  to  public  matters.  My 
answer  to  this  is,  that  when  business  men,  so  called,  who  are  supposed 
to  manage  and  control  the  great  interests  which  center  in  our  metrop- 
olis and  involve  the  prosperity  of  the  whole  country,  join  in  demon- 
strations of  a  political  nature,  it  is  well  for  us  to  learn  how  far  their 
business  interests  go  into  the  field  of  politics.  The  dashing  Ward, 
the  festive  Eno,  the  pious  Hatch,  the  humane  Seney,  the  devout  Bo- 
gart,  and  the  godly  Gould  all  join  in  an  apotheosis  to  the  Republican 
party,  as  if  they  were  worshiping  devoutly  some  emperor  lavish  with 
the  plunder  of  the  nations.  These  worship  at  the  Republican  shrine 
with  the  same  reverential  awe  as  the  Dorseys  and  Elkinses  of  the  postal 
Milky  Way.  The  big  king  of  the  gambling  financiers  himself  rushes 
into  print  to  hail  the  Republican  nominee  as  "a  live  man, "  "a  live 
President,"  as  "abreast  of  the  times,"  "  the  man  who  never  allows 
himself  to  fall  behind  a  single  step,"  "a  man  for  the  place."  Many 
such  "business  men"  are  so  high  above  the  people  that  they  osten- 
tatiously avoid  being  contaminated  by  association  with  industrious  men 
who  vote  the  Democratic  ticket  and  marshal  under  our  banner. 

THE  UXIOX  LEAGUE  DICTATORS. 

These  and  other  Jeremy  Diddlers  of  the  Union  League,  who  assume  to 
be  the  best  society  and  falsely  claim  the  highest  culture,  might  well  be 
spared  from  the  arena  of  politics  which  they  befoul  with  their  unsa- 
vory presence.  Let  us  endeavor  to  teach  fiduciary  agents  something 
of  that  fidelity  which  would  come  from  the  rule  of  honest  labor  and 
Democratic  practices.  They  and  their  brethren  of  the  street  should 
learn  something  of  the  philosophic  wisdom  of  Jefferson,  the  economic 
frugality  of  Franklin,  and  Jackson's  contempt  of  mere  money-mon- 


13 


gers  before  they  presume  to  dictate  to  honest  citizens  whom  they  shall 
elect  as  Chief  .Magistrate.  These  gamblers  in  millions  are  fit  asso- 
ciates perhaps  for  the  official  pirates  who  ran  New  York  city  in  18727 
and  who  were  always  promptly  at  the  front  of  the  citizens'  movement 
for  reform.  These  are  the  ' '  reformers  * '  who  gloried  in  the  Sherman  and 
Hayes  administration  of  1877.  The  speculators  and  bankers  who  gam- 
ble on  the  earnings  of  the  poor;  who  feather  their  own  nests  by  treachery 
and  falsehood;  who  buy  and  sell  what  they  do  not  have;  who  make 
bread  and  coal  dear  by  secret  combinations;  who  deify  successful  political 
profligacy;  who  would  exclude  honest  merit  from  social  position — are 
these  the  men  by  whom  reproach  can  be  cast  upon  those  who  seek  to 
make  society  honorable  under  the  pure  teachings  of  Democracy,  and  the 
nation  worthy  of  its  founders  ? 

The  example  of  these  gamblers  for  wealth  is  followed  not  alone  by 
the  confidence-men  who  will  meet  you  in  our  avenues  and  squares, 
not  alone  by  the  agent  who  may  collect  money  in  the  name  of  the 
Goddess  of  Liberty  and  the  Bartholdi  statue,  not  alone  by  the  clerk 
who  robs  his  employer  to  gratify  his  lust  of  gain,  not  alone  by  the  cashier 
or  the  president  of  a  bank  who  breaks  faith  with  those  by  whom  he  is 
trusted,  but,  alas !  also  by  men  who  have  obtained  leadership  in  the 
great  sanhedrim  of  political  organization.  Thus  the  decay  of  our  in- 
tegrity, beginning  with  the  very  fruit  and  flower  of  our  system,  ex- 
tends and  ramifies  its  blight  into  every  social  and  political  institution 
all  over  our  land. 

A  TIME  FOR  REFORM. 

However  numerous  the  modes  of  deceit  and  the  practices  of  fraud 
may  be,  however  demoralizing  the  prostitution  of  official  trusts  by 
public  officers  and  corporate  and  other  managers,  we  might  still  be 
able  to  bear  and  forbear  if  the  consequences  were  limited  to  the  records 
of  detected  frauds;  but  when  fraudulent  quotations  make  the  prices 
of  our  bonds  speculative,  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  other  restric- 
tions of  honest  business  modes  have  been  removed,  it  is  no  wonder 
that  hypothecations  and  sales  of  borrowed  property  have  been  made 
by  respectable  financiers  who  oppose  legal  restrictions  upon  their  pri- 
vate business  conduct,  and  complain  that  it  is  not  the  concern  of  the 
public  to  restrain  speculation  by  law.  The  pools  which  defy  and  set 
at  naught  the  honest  enterprises  of  industry  and  trade  and  depress  or 
enhance  values  at  pleasure,  might  be  of  little  moment  to  us  if  they 
only  affected  the  private  interests  of  conspirators;  but  when  great  pub- 
lic interests  are  injuriously  affected,  when  the  whole  market  reeks 
with  deceptive  and  fraudulent  deals  and  quotations  the  moral  atmo- 
sphere becomes  equally  tainted,  and  industrial  prostration,  bankruptcy, 
and  other  evil  results  follow.  "When  these  are  the  results  is  it  not  time 
to  attempt  some  public  and  business  reforms  ?  Is  it  not  high  time  to 
attempt  some  reform  when  a  great  political  party  in  its  candidacy  for 
the  most  honorable  office  in  the  gift  of  the  American  people  enthusi- 
astically nominates  for  that  high  estate  a  candidate  of  whom  it  would 
be  mild  language  to  say  that  he  is  reasonably  suspected  of  acquiring 
vast  wealth  by  the  prostitution  of  great  official  position  and  influ- 
ence ?  ' 

Allow  me  to  make  some  pregnant  illustrations  of  what  I  have  said. 
They  are  in  reference  to  corrupt  and  demoralizing  combinations  which 
cause  much  of  the  decay  of  integrity  both  in  business  and  political  rela- 
tions.   And  first,  as  illustrated  in  the  grasping  monopolies  under  our 


14 


tariff  system;  and  second,  the  grasping  combinations  and  pools  not 
originating  in  the  tariff. 

THE  OLD  TARIFF  THEORY  AND  THE  NEW. 

The  old  theory  of  protective  tariffs  was  based  on  the  idea  that  as  the 
countries  of  the  Old  World  had  great  knowledge  and  experience  in  the 
manufacturing  arts,  some  special  favors  should  be  extended  to  persons 
on  this  continent.  This  was  to  be  done  with  a  view  to  enable  and  en- 
courage them  to  develop  manufacturing  industry.  It  was  not  until 
after  many  years  that  the  question  of  protection  of  wages  entered  into 
the  tariff  policy.  The  larger  the  growth  of  our  manufacturing  indus- 
try the  more  important  became  the  question  of  wages. 

The  original  theory  vanished  long  since.  It  vanished  because  it  is 
now  admitted  on  all  sides  that  manufactures  are  so  firmly  established 
among  us  that,  so  far  as  tariffs  are  concerned,  the  laborer  is  the  only 
party  who  needs  protection. 

Then  it  follows  that  the  laborers  in  our  shops  and  factories  are  the 
only  parties  who  have  any  proper  interest  in  the  maintenance  of  high 
tariffs.  The  question  is:  Are  they  the  beneficiaries  ?  I  hold  that  they 
are  not ;  and  therefore  I  hold  that  the  operations  of  the  tariff  laws  are 
unj  ust.  These  laws  are  oppressive  to  the  full  extent  of  their  indirect 
taxation.  Show  me  that  these  laws  are  beneficial  to  the  mechanics  and 
other  laborers,  and  I  will  advocate  a  tariff  for  revenue  so  adjusted  as 
to  enhance  as  much  as  possible  the  rewards  of  labor.  I  will  do  this 
even  though  the  tax  weigh  heavy  on  the  whole  people,  if  I  have  con- 
stitutional power. 

We  have  the  constitutional  power  to  raise  all  our  Federal  revenue 
from  the  customs;  but  to  do  this  we  must  import  manufactured  goods. 
We  have  no  constitutional  power  to  enact  a  law  that  is  ostensibly  de- 
clared to  be  a  revenue  measure,  but  in  fact  the  opposite,  a  prohibition 
of  importation,  and  hence  in  its  operation  a  restraint  on  exportation. 
Our  people  can  not  engage  in  the  latter  without  practicing  the  former. 

The  Constitution  forbids  the  taxation  of  exports,  much  more  the 
larger  measures  of  prohibition.  The  reason  for  this  is  that  foreign  mar- 
kets are  a  prime  necessity  for  the  maintenance  of  our  farming  interests. 
The  more  these  are  developed  the  greater  the  necessity  for  observing  in 
good  faith  this  wise  restriction  on  Federal  power.  If  we  adopt  the 
policy  of  the  advocates  of  high  tariffs  we  must  favor  legislation  that  is 
forbidden  by  the  Constitution.  We  must  restrain  exportation.  We 
must  to  that  extent  restrain  the  development  of  our  greatest  industry, 
agriculture.    Would  this  be  wise? 

RESPECT  FOR  THE  CONSTITUTION. 

I  have  never  known  an  instance  of  unconstitutional  legislation  prov- 
ing beneficial  to  the  people.  Bad  logic  is  bad  law.  All  our  legislators 
are  sworn  to  obey  the  Constitution.  We  are  bound  to  respect  its  spirit 
as  well  as  its  letter.  I  believe  in  commerce  because  of  its  benefits.  All 
the  more  do  I  believe  it  my  duty  to  foster  commerce,  because  that  is  a 
duty  imposed  upon  us  by  the  Constitution,  which  we  have  sworn  to  obey. 

The  very  fact  that  the  protection  of  wages  was  never  in  the  early 
days  of  the  Republic  considered  as  being  within  the  scope  of  tariff 
legislation,  and  that  the  heavier  the  tariffs  the  more  talk  there  was  and 
is  of  the  necessity  for  protection  of  wages,  is  strong  evidence  that  the 
operation  of  a  tariff  is  inconsistent  with  the  theory  of  its  advocates. 
Why,  then,  do  these  men  insist  that  there  shall  be  free  trade  in  labor, 
and  that  we  should  violate  our  oaths  by  imposing  unconstitutional  re- 


15 


straints  on  the  large  business  of  exportation  ?  Is  it  because  the  labor  in 
our  mills  and  factories  is  benefited  ? 

AN  EXPOSURE  OF  THE  TARIFF  FRAUDS. 

In  my  addresses  to  Congress  this  session  on  the  tariff  question,  I 
proved  by  the  official  figures  that  under  the  tariff  laws  of  1880  the 
average  wages  in  our  manufacturing  industries  was  81.10  a  day  for 
three  hundred  working  days  in  the  year,  while  at  the  same  time  the 
average  profits  of  the  manufacturers  were  equal  to  36  per  cent,  of  their 
invested  capital.  I  also  proved  that  the  indirect  taxation  of  the  tariffs 
reduced  the  purchasing  power  of  these  wages  at  least  40  percent. 
This,  in  connection  with  the  well-known  fact  that  employers  are  ever 
on  the  alert  for  cheap  labor,  is  conclusive  proof  that  they  are  not  inter- 
ested in  maintaining  high  wages. 

Why,  then, do  employers  demand  high  tariffs?  Why  do  they  organ- 
ize lobbies  to  prevent  the  reduction  of  tariffs 9  Motives  of  philan- 
thropy are  not  the  inspiring  cause  of  these  lobbies.  I  will  show  you 
the  cause  of  their  efforts  in  the  sacred  name  of  labor — as  I  exposed  it 
in  my  last  address  to  Congress  on  this  subject.  It  is  the  insatiate 
greed  of  wealth.  I  thus  exposed  it.  I  thus  proved  by  cold  arithmetic 
the  extent  of  the  tariff  robbery: 

THE  EVIDENCE  OF  TARIFF  ROBBERY. 

First.  I  showed  by  the  figures  of  the  Tenth  Census  that  the  profits 
of  manufacturing  capital  for  the  year  covered  by  the  official  returns 
amounted  to  $1,024,801,847,  a  sum  equal  to  between  36  and  37  per 
cent,  of  the  capital  employed.  I  showed  that  if  this  profit  had  not 
exceeded  10  per  cent,  there  would,  at  the  wages  paid,  have  been  a  sav- 
ing to  consumers  of  8745,774,587;  that  this  sum  would  have  paid  all 
the  State  and  local  taxes  and  still  have  left  to  the  credit  of  the  con- 
sumers $443,573,863;  that  the  latter  sum,  saved  annually  for  six  years 
and  invested  in  United  States  3  per  cent,  bonds,  would  amount  to 
$2,861,051,610— a  sum  $70,779,004  in  excess  of  the  total  capital  in- 
vested in  1880  in  the  manufacturing  industries  of  the  United  States; 
that  this  six  years'  savings  would  pay  off  all  State,  Territorial,  county, 
municipal,  and  other  local  debts,  and  still  leave  unexpended  $1,804,- 
645,402;  that  this  six  years'  savings  would  exceed  by  $247,445,346  all 
the  paid  up  capital  of  all  the  railroad  companies  in  the  United  States 
in  1880;  and  that  six  years  more  of  such  savings  would  pay  off  all  the 
bonded  and  all  the  unfunded  debt  of  these  railroad  companies,  as  re- 
ported in  1880,  and  leave  an  unexpended  balance  of  $4^,935,314! 

Second.  I  further  showed  that  the  total  amount  of  wages  (including 
salaries  of  officers  and  clerks)  paid  in  1880  in  the  manufacturing  indus- 
tries was  $947,953,795;  that  on  a  6  per  cent,  return  to  the  capital  in- 
vested, the  manufacturers  could  have  paid,  in  1880,  to  their  employes 
90.45  per  cent,  in  excess  of  the  wages  paid  that  year;  that  on  a  10  per 
cent,  return  to  the  capital  they  could  have  paid  their  employes  78.62 
per  cent,  in  excess  of  the  wages  paid  that  year;  and  that  they  could 
have  paid  from  the  returns  accrued  to  their  capital  in  1880  all  the  State, 
Territorial,  county,  and  municipal  taxes,  and  46.79  per  cent,  more 
wages  to  their  employes  than  they  did,  and  still  have  a  return  of  10 
per  cent,  on  the  capital  employed  in  their  business. 

THE  ANNUA  I-  CONSCRIPTION. 

As  a  10  per  cent,  return  to  capital  was  liberal  in  a  year  in  which 
money  was  freely  invested  in  Government  bonds  bearing  low  interest, 
I  charged  that  our  tariff-protected  manufacturers  were  engrossing  the 


L6 


wealth  of  the  nation  at  the  rate  of  8745,774,587  per  annum,  while 
labor  was  receiving  the  bare  pittance  of  $1.16  a  day — equal  only  to  75 
cents  in  purchasing  power !  I  say  now,  as  I  said  then,  that  it  was  this 
annual  conscription  of  the  national  wealth  that  capitalized  all  the  other 
exacting  monopolies.  And  yet  the  Republican  party  dares  us  to  at- 
tempt tariff  reduction.  It  challenges  the  Democrats  to  make  this  an 
issue  in  the  approaching  political  campaign. 

It  is  this  system  of  tariff  concentration  of  our  great  and  enormously 
increasing  national  wealth  that  the  great  hulk  of  the  Democratic  party 
is  opposed  to.  It  is  this  system  that  the  Republican  party  is  as  de- 
termined to  maintain. 

The  evil  effects  of  tariffs  do  not  stop  at  the  iniquitous  exactions  from 
the  people,  the  incident  paralysis  of  industry,  and  the  degradation  of 
labor.  The  moral  tone  of  our  society  has  been  debased  by  this  open 
legalized  system  of  robbery  which  is  unblushingly  carried  out  under  the 
most  transparent  veil  of  hypocrisy  that  ever  disguised  a  fraud.  When 
I  see  so  plainly  this  tariff  monstrosity,  my  wonder,  my  indignation 
arises  almost  as  much  against  the  blindness  and  stupidity  of  the  grossly 
defrauded  laborers  who  adhere  to  the  party  that  legalizes  their  rob- 
bery and  enslaves  their  children,  as  it  does  against  the  robbers  them- 
selves. 

ASSOCIATIONS  FOR  PLUNDER. 

The  great  manufacturers  are  associated  for  two  purposes,  yea,  three, 
namely: 

First.  To  maintain  high  tariffs. 

Second.  To  maintain  high  prices  for  their  products. 

Third.  To  reduce  wages  as  low  as  possible  and  to  prevent  any  and 
every  organization  of  labor,  social,  industrial,  and  political,  that  would 
tend  to  defeat  any  of  these  objects. 

Any  young  man  of  talents  and  brilliant  qualities  as  an  advocate  can 
enter  the  service  of  these  associations  with  reasonable  prospect  of  high 
legislative  position,  if  he  has  sufficient  elasticity  of  conscience  to  yield 
to  their  seduction. 

Wealth  commands  talent.  Wealth  is  ' '  the  daughter  of  the  horse- 
leech, crying, '  Give ! '  '  Give ! '  "  "  The  grave ;  and  the  barren  womb ;  the 
earth  that  is  not  filled  with  water;  and  the  fire  that  saith  not,  'It  is 
enough,'  "  are  not  more  insatiate  than  the  tariff  spoilers. 

Surely  of  their  generation  was  spoken  the  word  of  Agur,  the  son  of 
Jakeh,  even  the  prophecy:  "There  is  a  generation,  whose  teeth  are  as 
swords,  and  their  jaw  teeth  as  knives,  to  devour  the  poor  from  off  the 
earth,  and  the  needy  from  among  men." 

I  would  remind  the  incorporated  devourers  of  the  poor  who,  like 
"Hell  and  destruction,  are  never  satisfied,"  that  "He  that  hasteth  to 
be  rich  hath  an  evil  eye  and  considereth  not  that  poverty  shall  come 
upon  him ;  "  "  He  that  is  greedy  of  gain  troubleth  his  own  house. ' '  I 
would  tell  them :  ' '  Better  it  is  to  be  of  an  humble  spirit  with  the  lowly 
than  to  divide  the  spoil  with  the  proud;  "  "  Better  is  a  little  with  right- 
eousness than  great  revenues  without  right." 

When  I  see  the  corrupt  methods  of  the  corporate  and  tariff  spoilers, 
the  social  and  political  degradation  that  they  have  brought  upon  us, 
I  thank  my  God  for  having  directed  my  steps  away  from  those  who 
haste  to  be  rich  on  the  unrequited  labors  of  the  poor,  and  for  enabling 
me  to  preserve  in  thought  and  deed  true  loyalty  to  my  oath  and  the 
Constitution  in  the  halls  of  legislation. 

It  is  this  ill-gotten  tariff  wealth  that  has  caused  the  decay  of  integrity 


17 


in  our  business  and  political  relations  and  fostered  the  development  of 
other  monopolies.  It  was  amassed  in  fraud  of  the  people  by  modes 
that  have  cast  reproach  on  the  legislative  branch  of  our  Government. 
It  has  long  controlled  legislation  and  made  the  way  easy  for  many  vio- 
lations of  the  Constitution  in  the  name  of  national  developments. 

THE  PUBLIC  LANDS  TRUSTS. 

The  lands  transferred  to  the  Federal  Government  in  trust  for  the 
people  by  Virginia  and  other  of  the  old  States  that  forjned  this  Union, 
and  those  subsequently  acquired,  were  long  regarded  as  a  sacred  her- 
itage. This  trust  was  fairly  guarded  until  the  high-tariff  party  obtained 
control.  Then  it  was  that  the  policy  of  lavish  grants  to  railroad  cor- 
porations came  in  vogue. 

From  the  year  1864  to  1875  the  Republicans  had  full  control  of  both 
branches  of  Congress.  In  the  House  of  Representatives  Schuyler  Col- 
fax was  Speaker  from  December  7,  1863,  to  March  3,  1869.  For  six 
years  thereafter  the  present  nominee  of  the  Republican  party  for  the 
high  office  of  President  of  the  United  States,  a  gentleman  of  still  more 
unsavory  fame  then  his  predecessor  in  the  Speakership,  presided  in  the 
House. 

In  the  eleven  years  following  1863  Republican  Congresses  voted  296,- 
000,000  of  acres  of  our  public  lands  to  a  few  corporations,  in  addition  to 
millions  upon  millions  of  public  money.  Very  much  of  the  latter  was 
used  as  a  corruption  fund  for  members  who  were  in  haste  to  be  rich. 
These  grants  exceeded  in  area  that  of  all  the  farms  in  the  United  States 
in  1880;  exceeded  it  by  many  millions  of  acres.  They  exceeded  by 
75,000,000  acres  the  area  of  the  thirteen  original  States.  This  em- 
pire, equal  in  area  to  fifteen  average  States  of  the  Union,  was  vested 
in  the  possession  of  a  handful  of  millionaires  who  now  wield  the  full 
political  power  of  at  least  that  number  of  States. 

Is  not  this  another  illustration  of  the  monstrous  combinations  of  mo- 
nopolies? Have  not  these  caused  the  decay  of  political  morality?  Is 
not  the  gambling  in  stocks  secured  by  these  infamous  grants  another 
illustration  of  the  decay  in  business  morality  ?  Do  you  ever  stop  to  con- 
sider the  effect  of  these  stocks,  both  direct  and  indirect,  as  an  obstacle 
in  the  way  of  the  attempt  made  in  Congress  to  make  some  restitution 
of  the  lands  despoiled  from  the  people  in  violation  of  a  most  sacred  trust? 
If  you  do,  you  will  begin  to  know  something  of  one  of  the  causes  of  the 
decay  of  integrity  that  is  second  only  to  the  tariffs  in  its  baleful  in- 
fluences on  public  and  private  morality. 

THE  FALSE  REPUBLICAN  PLATFORM. 

We  have  created  our  masters — our  task-masters.  They  dictate  our 
laws,  our  tariffs,  our  wages,  and  our  rates  of  transportation.  They 
scarce  allow  us  straw  to  make  the  brick  for  their  pyramids  of  wealth. 
Their  greed  is  only  equaled  by  their  effrontery.  The  climax  of  their 
audacity  is  the  last  Republican  platform,  hung  with  false  lights  to  lure 
the  people  to  their  wreckers. 

When  will  labor  arouse  from  its  lethargy  ?  Is  there  any  haven  for  it 
in  the  Democratic  party  ?  If  not,  farewell  to  the  Republic  of  our  fath- 
ers. But  I  do  not  despair  of  the  Republic.  When  our  people  begin  to 
discuss  the  tariff  policy  their  natural  quickness  of  perception  and  good 
sense  will  soon  bring  them  as  right  on  this  question  as  they  are  on  the 
other  monopoly  issues. 

The  genius  of  greed  needs  no  legislation  to  foster  its  passion.  If  I 
could  make  the  law,  my  aim  would  be  to  render  it  impossible  for  any 
Co  2 


18 


man  to  accumulate  a  million  dollars  while  labor  was  glad  to  earn  a 
dollar  and  sixteen  cents  a  day  the  year  round.  While  this  condition  of 
industry  remains,  the  fraud  of  tariff  protection  is  patent,  and  corporate 
enterprise  is  robbery. 

If  you  would  have  progress,  prosperity,  virtue,  and  reform,  yourrep- 
resentatives  and  officials  must  not  be  hirelings  of  millionaires  or  direct- 
ors of  corporations.  Ye  can  not  gather  figs  from  brambles  nor  grapes 
from  thistles.  Holy  writ  says,  ye  can  not  serve  two  masters.  Ye 
can  not  serve  God  and  mammon;  neither  can  your  legislators  nor  exec- 
utives nor  judges.  They  must  hate  you  and  love  mammon,  or  else  the 
reverse. 

If  such  be  the  political  ethics  and  practice  as  to  political  economy  in 
our  public  lands,  yon  will  not  wonder  that  the  laboring  man  is  poorly 
recompensed  for  his  day's  Labor,  and  that  even  the  Scotch  crofter  and 
t  he  I  rish  tenant,  oppressed  as  they  are  by  harsh  lawsand  avaricious  land- 
lords, begin  to  hesitate  about  yielding  to  the  attractive  forces  of  that 
emigration  which  has  filled  our  shores. 

REPURLICAN  PHARISEES. 

You  have  read  of  the  pharisee  who  thanked  God  that  he  was  better 
than  other  men,  therefore  you  wonder  not  that  even  the  Republican 
platform-makers  assume  a  virtue  which  they  have  not  in  resolving 
against  the  consummation  of  their  own  land  thefts,  and  the  turning 
over  to  foreigners  of  large  areas  of  our  public  domain.  You  need  not 
wonder  that  our  nation  has  become  a  shipless  one  under  the  rule  of 
such  a  party. 

With  such  examples  of  corruption  as  those  furnished  by  the  Repub- 
lican administrations  you  are  not  surprised  at  the  testimony  given  be- 
fore our  investigating  committees  as  to  the  inutility  and  perfidiousness 
of  the  "star-route"  prosecutions.  Even  the  bar,  not  to  speak  of  the 
jury,  are  tainted  by  the  order  to  "let  Dorsey  and  others  go."  Are  you 
surprised  that  a  leading  Republican  paper  in  1883,  despairing  of  any 
reformation  under  a  Republican  administration,  cried,  after  the  ac- 
quittal of  the  Bradys  and  Dorseys,  ".Turn  the  rascals  out."  Was 
there  ever  a  shame  equal  to  the  Republican  mode  of  prosecution  or  to 
that  verdict  of  acquittal  ?  Was  there  ever  a  cause  for  public  shame 
equal  to  the  impudence  and  arrogance  of  those  other  rascals  who,  never 
acquitted  because  not  indicted,  have  undertaken  to  make  nominations 
for  the  American  people  to  fill  the  highest  offices  of  trust?  If  it  be 
impossible  to  find  a  jury  in  Washington  to  convict  representative  Re- 
publican statesmen  in  such  palpable  cases  of  grand  larceny,  can  we  ex- 
pect that  the  smaller  thieves,  the  Howgates  and  the  Burnsides,  will 
not  go  acquit  of  their  crimes  and  unwhipt  of  justice? 

TURN  THE  RASCALS  OUT. 

The  business  methods  of  the  Executive  Departments  under  Repub- 
lican administration  are  very  like  those  of  the  many  robbed  and  broken 
banks.  The  accounts  of  the  paymaster  in  the  Post-Office  Department 
had  not  been  audited  for  three  years;  and  though  the  amount  of  pec- 
ulation may  be  quite  small  in  a  federal  way,  as  compared  with  others 
that  occurred  in  the  Departments,  or  many  recent  ones  in  bankingbusi- 
ness,  the  temptations  to  the  embezzlement  of  money  by  the  fever  of 
speculation  and  immunities  given  to  our  magnificent  rascals  became 
more  and  more  frequent.  The  extent  of  Republican  embezzlements 
and  peculations  will  never  be  known  until  we — "turn  the  rascals 
out." 


19 


OFFICIAL  LOBBYISTS. 

Much  has  been  said,  and  doubtless  truthfully,  of  the  lobbies  around 
onr  Legislative  bodies.  Much  has  been  said  as  to  the  control  of  lobbies 
at  Albany,  Harrisburg,  and  Washington.  Doubtless  the  lobby  at  the 
latter  place  has  been  bold,  even  beyond  the  vigorous  grammar  of  Senator 
Logan  to  denounce.  He  publicly  acknowledged  sonic  weeks  ago  that 
he  had  been  excessively  lobbied  for  a  railroad  grantor  other  monopoly 
in  the  Yellowstone  by  a  high  Republican  official  in  our  Land  Depart- 
ment. The  party  which  shamelessly  confesses  to  having  elevated  Gar- 
field by  the  use  of  money,  and  which,  as  has  been  alleged,  recently  used 
money  lavishly  for  the  transportation  of  purchasable  delegates  to  Chi- 
cago, and  consigned  them  there  to  the  care  of  its  confidence  men,  affords 
a  striking  illustration  of  the  difference  between  precept  and  practice. 
It  has  not  improved  upon  its  former  teaching.  Its  long-established 
practice  and  present  conduct  and  policy,  make  the  combinations  and 
log-rolling  for  public-building  and  river-and-harbor  plunder  bills  ve- 
nial, compared  with  the  repeated  attempts,  which  have  signally  failed 
in  the  House  of  Representatives,  to  carry  a  measure  for  New  York  bank- 
ers by  which  to  appreciate  securities  and  help  a  firm  heavily  loaded 
with  a  certain  class  of  bonds. 

Official  corruption,  base  political  methods,  the  connection  between 
bursting  banks  in  New  York,  closing  savings-banks  in  New  Jersey, 
and  the  attempted  Republican  legislation  in  Washington,  together  with 
the  frantic  efforts  to  stop  the  late  panic  by  calling  Government  bonds 
in  advance  of  expectancy — thus  giving  Government  aid  and  part  ici- 
pancy  in  rings  of  corrupt  speculators — all  illustrate  the  decay  of  integ- 
rity in  a  political,  business,  and  social  point  of  view. 

Is  it  in  vain  to  call  attention  to  the  $387,000,000  wasted  upon  an  un- 
seen navy?  Is  it  in  vain  to  inveigh  against  the  Robesons,  Belknaps, 
and  others  who  have  made  official  life  suspicious  by  reason  of  their 
partialities? 

A  DEGRADED  JUDICIARY. 

Yet  these  public  wrongs  are  as  nothing  compared  with  the  contempt 
which  has  been  heaped  upon  our  supreme  judiciary.  The  bench  may 
no  longer  boast  of  its  immaculate  ermine.  Even  beibre  it  was  dragged 
into  the  mire  through  which  Hayes  was  elevated,  it  had  lost  much  of 
that  sanctity  which  was  our  best  guarantee  of  liberty  and  justice. 
The  miscarriage  of  justice  on  that  occasion  was  not  alone  due  to  the 
corruptions  incident  to  this  age  of  moral  decay.  It  was  a  conquest  by 
corporate  money-power  aided  by  political  bigotry  and  partisan  malice — 
a  crime  against  our  institutions  that  was  condoned  and  defended  by 
some  of  the  highest  men  in  the  Republican  party.  Perhaps  this  startling 
degradation  of  the  judical  office  was  less  astounding  at  the  time  because 
the  people  had  become,  in  some  sort,  accustomed  to  vicious  and  merce- 
nary judicial  practices  in  political  affairs. 

The  times  which  make  such  men  as  Jay  Gould  possible  have  made 
us  indifferent  to  deeds  that  would  have  outraged  our  former  sense  of 
honor  and  duty.  Is  not  the  very  form  and  system  of  our  Government 
perverted  when  men  like  Gould  can  openly  boast  of  using  the  legisla- 
ture and  the  court  for  theirselfish  ends  ?  Is  there  not  decay  in  the  land 
where  judges  sit  in  the  highest  courts  whose  gowns  have  been  thrown 
upon  their  shoulders  by  cunning  intrigue  if  not  by  mercenary  litigants  ? 
Is  there  not  a  vulture  tearing  at  the  vitals  of  honest  industry  when 
aboard  of  directors,  controlled  by  one  man,  is  permitted  to  double  its 
corporate  stock  by  watering,  and  distribute  its  shares  broadcast  among 


20 


his  friends?  It  is  because  such  things  as  these  are  possible  in  this 
Republic  that  panics  come  to  us  and  the  hard-earned  wages  of  labor 
are  evanescent.  It  is  as  true  that  the  corruption  \\  hich  belongs  to  our 
public  life  has  been  caused  as  much  by  the  profligacy  of  private  life, 
as  that  the  corruption  of  private  life  has  been  fostered  by  the  oppor- 
tunities which  public  life  has  afforded. 

There  is  great  need  of  business,  social,  and  political  reform.  We 
have  had  many  sad  days  in  our  history;  but  the  saddest  of  all  is  to 
come  if  a  leader  such  as  the  one  recently  chosen  at  Chicago,  one  whose 
great  wealth  has,  it  is  said,  been  acquired  by  the  manipulation  of 
public  credit  and  legislation,  shall  be  elected  to  sit  in  the  seat  of  exec- 
utive power,  with  all  its  opportunities  for  political  and  financial  re- 
wards. The  modes  of  the  campaign  which  ensue  from  the  recent 
contest  at  Chicago  will  be  dictated  not  by  virtue  and  fidelity  to  good 
principles,  but  by  the  reckless,  unblushing  practices  of  those  who  seek 
to  corruptly  influence  the  public  vote. 

CAN  THE  LAW  BE  ENFORCED? 

What  is  the  remedy  for  these  recent  aberrations  and  crimes?  We 
must  appeal  to  the  electoral  as  well  as  the  judicial  tribunals.  We  must 
have  a  purer  administration  of  power  and  justice.  The  unparalleled 
swindlers  must  have  some  other  form  of  trial  than  before  a  Washington 
jury.  The  demand  for  extradition  of  embezzlers  and  public  thieves 
must  be  stronger  than  our  present  State  Department  is  disposed  to  make. 
Why  are  the  wholesome  provisions  of  the  national  banking  laws  al- 
lowed to  remain  inert  on  the  statutes  ?  The  Federal  officers  high  and 
low  whose  duty  it  is  to  enforce  them  have  been  criminally  inactive; 
they  should  be  themselves  arraigned  as  criminals.  Our  law  declares 
that  every  officer  or  agent  of  any  national  bank  who  embezzles,  ab- 
stracts, or  willfully  misapplies  any  of  the  moneys,  funds,  or  credits  of 
the  association,  or  who  makes  any  false  entry  in  any  book,  report,  or 
statement,  and  every  person  who  aids  or  abets  any  such  business,  shall 
be  imprisoned  not  less  than  five  nor  more  than  ten  years.  Can  this  law 
be  executed  ?  If  not,  let  us  know  the  reason  why.  Let  the  national 
banks  undergo  a  searching  inquisition.  Let  the  right  kind  of  exam- 
iners be  appointed.  Let  the  apathy  which  now  reigns  be  changed  to 
activity  by  the  demand  of  the  people,  and  we  will  have  some  amazing 
and  mysterious  disclosures  that  will  lead  to  reformations  such  as  reno- 
vated France  after  the  bursting  of  John  Law's  bubble. 

THE  PLATFORM  OF  THE  PEOPLE. 

But  there  are  other  remedies  besides  those  of  the  law.  The  working 
people  are  not  satisfied  with  the  modes  of  the  present  great  parties.  They 
are  organizing  against  monopolies.  They  may  not  very  clearly  see  where 
the  grievous  wrong  is,  but  they  know  that  the  rich  are  growing  richer  as 
the  toiling  millions  are  growing  poorer.  The  working  people  are  watch- 
ing the  oil  monopolies  and  money  engrossers,  the  national  bankers  and 
political  Jeremy  Diddlers,  the  bank  embezzlers  and  official  peculators, 
with  a  keen  and  vigilant  eye.  They  are  noting  the  extent  of  the  money- 
power  in  political  parties.  They  demand  that  labor  and  capital  shall 
be  allies  in  profits  as  well  as  production.  They  proclaim  that  charters 
are  repealable  and  controllable  by  the  power  that  granted  them;  that 
economy  must  be  exercised  in  the  public  service;  that  bounties  shall  no 
longer  be  given  for  the  largess  of  the  few  against  the  welfare  of  the 
many;  that  taxes  be  levied  only  for  the  economic  ends  of  Government; 
and  that  unnecessary  taxation  must  bring  corrupting  surpluses.  They 


2] 


indict  the  old  organizations — the  Republican  party  for  gross  dishonesty 
and  the  usurpation  and  prostitution  of  Federal  power;  the  Democratic 
party  for  itssupineness,  its  want  of  vigorous  policy  audits  toleration  of 
Mammon.  They  insist  that  the  best  interests  of  the  people,  the  many, 
must  be  regarded,  as  well  in  their  daily  life  in  respect  to  shelter,  cloth- 
ing, and  food,  as  in  their  hours  of  labor,  their  system  of  education,  and 
their  share  in  our  institutions  and  common  heritage.  They  demand 
that  the  men  who  labor  least  shall  not  have  the  best  and  largest  re- 
wards. They  point  to  the  awful  chasm  which  has  been  widening  every 
day  between  our  two  great  classes,  the  employers  and  the  toilers. 

REFORM  THROUGH  POLITICAL  ORGANIZATION. 

Do  not  the  great  ramparts  of  wealth  that  were  founded  in  robber  tar- 
iffs, reared  high  by  corporate  exactions,  and  manned  by  the  political 
band  of  the  money  lords  challenge  an  outbreak  of  communism  that 
may  at  any  time  destroy  them?  The  bad  blood  which  caused  the  out- 
break at  Cincinnati  the  other  day  is  some  evidence  of  the  need  of  a 
timely  reform.  Peaceful  reform  must  come  from  the  good  sense  and 
integrity  of  the  people  through  political  organizations.  They  must 
combine  to  reform.  They  must  communicate  with  each  other  to  secure 
concert  of  action  for  reform.  Is  the  needed  reform  to  come  through  the 
Democratic  party  ?  It  is  not  the  party  of  the  tariff  robber,  the  com- 
merce destroyer,  or  wealth  engrosser.  Its  motto  is,  "A  lair  held  for 
labor  in  all  industries  and  no  special  privileges  to  capital. ' '  We  believe 
that  commerce  should  be  so  regulated  between  the  States  that  the  price 
of  bread,  coal,  and  the  other  necessaries  of  life  may  not  be  unduly  en- 
hanced. We  demand  that  the  importation  of  foreign  labor  under  con- 
tract should  be  prohibited.  We  say  that  not  only  shall  no  further  sub- 
sidies of  public  lauds  be  granted,  but  that  Congress  must  repeal  the 
grants  of  lands  already  forfeited  by  the  faithless  corporators. 

LAND-GRANT  FORFEITURES. 

What  has  Congress  done  in  regard  to  land  restitution  ?  Already  the 
Democratic  House  has  begun  the  work.    The  following  is  a  list  of  the 


forfeiture  bills  passed  in  the  House  at  the  present  session.  This  list 
gives  the  names  of  the  corporations  and  the  acreage  we  are  trying  to 
recover  for  the  people : 

Acres. 

Gulf  and  Ship  Island  Railroad   612.  soo 

Tuscaloosa  and  Mobile  Railroad    688, 000 

Coosa  and  Tennessee  Railroad   140,060 

Savannah  and  Albany  Railroad   900,  OCX) 

New  Orleans  and  State  lane  Railroad   120,800 

Little  Bock  and  Fort  Smith  Railroad   1,057,024 

Texas  Pacific  Railroad   14.309,700 

Oregon  Central  Railroad   1,130,880 

California  and  Oregon  Railroad   2,  126,  .126 

Atlantieand  Pacific  Railroad   16,000,000 

Sioux  City  and  Saint  Paul  Railroad   85,654 


Total   37,211,504 

The  following  bills  are  on  the  House  Calendar  : 

Acres. 

New  Orleans,  Raton  Rouge  and  Yicksburg  Railroad   903,218 

Oregon  and  California  Railroad   8,701,760 

Marquette, Houghton  and  Ontonagon  Railroad   627,200 

Ontonagon  and  Brule  River  Railroad   232,849 

Marquetteand  State  Line  Railroad   540, 

Northern  Pacific  Railroad   20,000,000 

Southern  Pacific,  of  California   7,500,000 


22 


How  many  of  these  bills  will  become  law?  I  fear  a  satisfactory 
answer  will  have  to  await  the  action  of  a  Democratic  Congress. 

REPUBLICAN  DUPES  AND  AUGURS. 

Shall  we,  like  the  augurs  of  the  Republican  party,  regard  these  prin- 
ciples as  mere  generalizations  for  the  delusion  of  honest  voters  on  elec- 
tion day.  and  wink  at  each  other  over  the  cheat  ?  Itisnotby  the  worship 
of  the  golden  calf  into  which  the  Republican  Israel  has  strayed  that 
Democracy  can  restore  the  ancient  faith.  A  compact  organization  of 
prejudice,  insatiate  greed,  and  vast  money  power  confronts  us.  If  we 
would  emancipate  and  have  labor  for  our  allies,  we  must  enter  on  re- 
form in  no  hesitating  fashion.  Our  standard-bearers  must  be  good  men, 
tried  and  true.  The  demands  for  reform  are  not  to  be  disregarded.  The 
party  that  disregards  them  will  soon  lack  the  votes  to  give  it  the  powrer 
for  reform.  The  party  which  disregards  the  industrial  toilers,  and  levies 
and  continues  to  levy  heavy  tribute  upon  the  people,  and  impose  count- 
less wrongs  upon  the  millions,  will  not  be  the  party  of  success,  though 
its.- platform  be  studded  with  all  the  political  and  social  platitudes  of 
the  times.  The  victory  of  the  people  is  at  hand.  The  party  of  the 
people  can  not  be  led  by  doctrinaires  nor  controlled  by  mere  money. 

THE  FLAME  OF  DISCONTENT. 

The  frequent  election  of  millionaires  to  the  Senate  and  the  House  of 
Representatives  only  adds  fresh  fuel  to  the  flame  of  discontent.  The 
monstrous  accumulations  of  wealth  in  the  hands  of  a  few,  through  leg- 
islative partiality,  must  soon  receive  a  check  at  the  hands  of  an  indig- 
nant people.  Legal  trickeries,  the  extortions  of  railroad  pools  and 
tariffs,  breaches  of  trust  and  of  the  Constitution,  and  other  reckless  dis- 
regards of  social  and  political  order  we  must  grapple  with,  but  the  main 
contest  will  be  with  the  giant  of  monopoly,  whose  pockets  are  lined 
with  money,  whose  agents  and  directors  sit  in  our  Legislatures,  and  whose 
platitudes  of  hypocrisy  and  greed  furnish  planks  for  the  fraudulent  po- 
litical platforms  of  the  part}^  in  power.  History  repeats  itself.  It 
warns  us  of  the  fate  of  nations  in  which  the  privileges  of  the  few  are 
allowed  to  override  the  liberties  and  interests  of  the  many. 

Are  we  to  learn  the  lesson  of  the  French  Revolution  by  practical  incul- 
cation ?  It  is  the  old  story  of  the  downfall  of  nations — of  royalty  gam- 
bling in  the  provinces  of  the  people,  of  enormous  fortunes  squeezed  out 
of  the  industrial  masses,  of  judgeships  purchased,  of  juries  suborned,  of 
granted  monopolies,  of  crime  punished  only  when  the  criminal  is  poor. 
It  is  the  old,  old  story  of  corruption  sowing  the  seeds  which  yield  the 
harvest  of  chaos  and  destruction. 

THE  BASE  FASCINATION. 

One  would  think  that  in  this  age  and  country  the  preservation  of  law 
and  order  would  be  the  first  object  of  those  who  have  a  desire  for  the 
security  of  property  and  the  maintenance  of  liberty.  One  would  think 
that  the  honest  business  interests  of  this  country  would  look  askance  at 
such  nominations  as  have  recently  been  made  at  Chicago,  and  aid  in 
administering  the  remedy.  One  would  think  that  a  people  like  our 
own,  with  an  inheritance  so  splendid,  with  an  ancestry  providentially 
guided  here,  and  with  the  example  set  them  by  generations  of  patriotic 
men  who  have  passed  from  us,  would  still  retain  the  freshness  and 
purity  of  virtuous  pow  er.  Our  lands  and  mines  and  rivers  and  forests 
and  our  very  oil  wells  and  fisheries — all  the  bounteous  elements  of  sea 
and  earth  and  sky — would  seem  to  beckon  our  legislators,  our  judges, 
our  executives,  and  our  ministers  of  official  grace  and  honor  away  from 


• 


the  base  fascinations  of  hoarded  pelf  which  dishonors  to  destroy  our  in- 
stitutions. 

ITASTK  TO  THE  WOKK  OK  KKKOK ML 

We  must  haste  to  the  work  of  reform.  America  in  its  fresh  hemis- 
phere, in  its  first  cycle  of  liberty,  with  the  vote,  with  the  numbers, 
with  the  added  wisdom  and  practical  sagacity  of  her  people,  must  clar- 
ify the  political  and  social  atmosphere,  and  declare  for  a  new  order  of 
administration  ere  the  light  of  our  liberties  be  extinguished.  Let  not 
progress  and  poverty  march  abreast  in  this  as  in  the  older  hemisphere. 
Let  us  make  the  American  Republic  an  exemplar  for  all  future  repub- 
lics which  may  be  created  by  the  achievements  of  free  men.  Now  that 
the  world  is  adapting  itself  to  new  developments  of  physical  forces  and 
moral  resources,  now  that  new  boundaries  are  being  made  between  the 
nations,  now  that  new  elements  are  startling  kings  and  kaisers,  and 
giving  fleet  coursers  to  civilization  by  the  vapor  of  water  and  the  spark 
of  lightning,  let  progress  and  prosperity  march  hand  in  hand  on  this 
continent.    Let  us  not  prove  recreant  to  the  demands  of  this  new  order. 

THE  ONWARD  MARCH. 

National  wealth  is  not  alwaj^s  national  prosperity;  nor  does  great 
progress  always  imply  corresponding  happiness.  The  world  is  moving, 
but  is  humanity  benefited  ? 

Let  our  progress  be  in  the  paths  of  peace,  of  humanity,  and  justice,  and 
all  our  victories,  in  the  interest  of  liberty  and  industr}'.  Let  the  torch 
of  patriotism  shine  out  upon  the  shoals  and  reefs  where  the  wreckers 
would  despoil  our  ship  of  state,  so  that  free,  unbiased  as  the  winds 
and  waves,  she  may  sail  on  forever  freighted  with  the  hopes  and  the 
happiness  of  our  human  kind. 


2 


